Kyle,
I think the pine on the trimount with the lion and Moluag in dexter and sinister chief is by far the best of the MacLea bunch.
One possible addition—which adds a little bit of clutter but would make it more W. Highland—would be to add a base wavy, either of a metal or barry wavy, below the trimount with the salmon on it, proper.
Other W. Highland arms with similar format of a main charge with two different small charges in chief (from the Campbell of Airds article on the HSS site):
Shaw of Tordarroch
http://www.heraldry-scotland.co.uk/images/westhigh/eighteen6.jpg
Clanranald
http://www.heraldry-scotland.co.uk/images/westhigh/ten2.jpg
There are lots of Irish arms with a similar format as well; see http://www.heraldry-scotland.co.uk/westhigh5.html
Perhaps something like the Shaw of Tordarroch design might work….let me try this in Kyle’s Bastardized Blazon
Per fess Or and Azure, in chief a Lion Rampant Gules and Hand of St Moluag, overall a New England Pine proper upon a trimount in base Or?
Of course, that seems to give pine rising through the water look, but I’d have to see what it looked like I guess. Let me give that a try…
Kyle=
Here, I bastardized Fr. Byer’s version with a Fess.
(By the way, how do I insert the pictures in the text rather a link?)
Kyle=
I then went a little further and tried this design per-pale and then per pale and per fess, and then finally quarterly again, but with the Pine Tree overall.
I didn’t add in the fish, but that could certainly be done.
Apologies/thanks to Fr. Byers whose files I have used as a basis!
Kyle MacLea;51606 wrote:
(By the way, how do I insert the pictures in the text rather a link?)
You’ll need an internet server to host the picture. I use imageshack.us to host my pictures. Once you list them they’ll give you a "direct link to images" and a URL. You can either click the gray mountain on yellow background image at the top of the post (A clear tincture violation BTW) or type {IMG}(copy URL from imageshack here){/IMG} with [] instead of {}. It will look something like this in the text editor
{IMG}http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/2992/colinarmsartistdennyee1.jpg{/IMG}
If you replace the {}‘s with []‘s you’ll get my CoA from Denny’s emblazonment.
FYI-they’ll ask you to select a size for the image when uploading to imageshack.us for Message boards I usually choose the 320 x 240 option.
Thanks, Colin. That makes sense. I’ll see what I can do from here on.
Here are some of the ideas so far at a glance, if I can get this to work:
http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/6315/macleao3yq7.png http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/8092/macleao3fessfd2.jpg http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/7429/macleao3paleoh9.jpg http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/7951/macleao3palefesslm1.jpg
Kyle=
Kyle MacLea;51610 wrote:
And some more… http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/7656/macleafla2zc0.png
I like this one, even though I fear it’s technically a tincture violation. (I think the flauches are on the field right?)
If not then it might be nice to make the entire thing, and add some wavey azure bars to connect the flauches (behind the tree") as another not so busy allusion to the MacLea arms. So:
Per Pall Argent and Or between flauches counterchanged charged with a Lion Rampant and a Hand Gulles holding a cross botany (?), three bars wavey Azure below a Pine Tree atop a three crested hill Vert. (realize this blazon is almost certainly not accurate, but hopefully you get the point)
That may be a bit too busy though.
I think that there are some interesting ideas coming about and you’ll have to do "The Fridge Test" © Mike McCartney.
Personally I think the main charge of the tree with smaller lion and hand/cross in chief works very well, and best with a plain field Or.
I was a little concerned that it might start to head off into Farquharson territory (especially Finzean) but I’ve checked out the blazon there (and the other Farquharsons) and they all have either quarterly coats or have the lion as the main charge.
Finzean does appear to be the nearest but the arms there are
Or a lion rampant Gules armed and langued Azure accompanied by three Scots Fir trees eradicated in chief on a canton of the third a saltire Argent.
Interestingly there is no tincture given for the trees but I assume that they are Proper, the Farquaharsons of Invercauld and of Haughton have their trees Proper.
James
For the version with tall tree throughout and the lion and cross in chief, I think I liked the version on argent better. It seemed cleaner, and argent was the field for both the cross & hand of the MacLea’s and the pine tree of New England.
As for Silvia, this is not quite what you asked to see, Kyle, but here is one I really like:
That IS beautiful, Fr. Dohrman. It even has the advantage of ever FURTHER meaning "forest" by including deciduous trees! The simplification of colors makes it also very nice.
What does everybody think about that one?
This begs the question, if the background of the MacLea arms were Argent, it would show a closer relationship to maybe try Argent here too… But I really like the Or. But maybe I’ll have to try this and see.
Kyle=
I would counterchange everything (vert field, Or border) but I like it a lot
Thanks to Colin and Fr. Dohrman for their suggestions as well.
Let’s try putting some of these arms next to each other and seeing how they look.
First, the Tree-on-Or motif:
And now for the Argent versions
I did think of "silver" as further pseudo-cant for "silvia" but I still think I prefer the Or version. (Though I am thinking of Argent for a component of his Crest for that reason.)
Do folks prefer the Argent or Or versions? (Admittedly, my countercharged photoshop job is pretty sloppy, sorry about that! But thanks to Fr. Dohrman for providing such great templates to work from!)
